Empire of Lies

by Raymond Khoury

  Ramazan was visibly alarmed, leaning in while darting glances around them to make sure no one was near. “What are you doing?” he hissed.

  “Hang on.”

  She found the right spot and listened to it.

  She was right.

  “Damn it,” she hissed. “How could we have missed that?”

  “What?”

  “We forgot to ask a key question.”

  “Which is?”

  “When he gave us the incantation, the example he used was of how he would travel back to his time, which was what you asked him. But he didn’t tell us how to travel forward.” Her words were tumbling out, having a hard time catching up with her mind, which was frantically looking for a solution. “We wouldn’t know how to get back here if we went back in time. You have to talk to him one last time. You have to get him to tell you how he came here.”

  * * *

  Nisreen’s words were like a chainsaw to his already-frayed nerves. She was asking him to go back in and risk more time with Rasheed. “I can’t,” he hissed.

  “You have to.”

  “I can’t. I’ve got two more surgeries this afternoon. Then Fonseca wants me to wake our guy up. He’s insisting.”

  “So do it then.”

  Her fierce determination was so hard to resist. But he had to. “He wants to be there. He’s really curious about him.”

  “Delay him. Do it alone.”

  “No,” Ramazan replied. “We’ve put ourselves at enough risk already.” He was about to add, “We should just let it go,” when that familiar feeling swept over him: that Nisreen considered him weak and cowardly. “Besides,” he said instead, “Moshe … he’s a stubborn bastard. And he’ll be out of the OR before me. He’ll be waiting for me.”

  “Find a way.” There was fire in her eyes. “You have to, Ramazan. Delay him somehow.”

  Ramazan’s expression darkened further. Fear was assaulting him from all sides. “This isn’t good. Even if I manage it … if I bring him out fully just after that, he might remember. Which might trigger him and make him remember everything. Which is the last thing we need. I mean, who knows what he might do if he thinks we know something we shouldn’t. And what if he asks me about it in front of Fonseca?”

  “I don’t know. Just … say he’s delirious. Say he must have dreamt it. Say it’s quite common. You’re the expert, not him.”

  She was so good at coming up with solutions. “I don’t like it, hatun.”

  “The incantation is just a one-way ticket without it. It’s useless.”

  “We can’t try this, Nisreen.”

  “We can’t without the rest of it.”

  Ramazan checked his watch. “I have to get back.”

  She reached out and grabbed his arm. “Find a way, Ramazan. Please. It would be an incredible waste if you didn’t.”

  He looked at her, searching for a trace of that newfound admiration he’d seen in her eyes the night before, at home, before they’d gone to the hospital. Relenting, he said, “I’ll try.”

  As he said it, he thought he glimpsed a flicker of what he’d been hoping for.

  She softened her grip, and took his hand instead. “Whatever happens … we’re in this together. All the way. And I have faith in you.”

  His heart expanded, pushing away the shroud of gloom that was circling him, and he got up, kissed her on the cheek, and walked away.

  28

  Huseyin Celaleddin Pasha stood by the window of his top-floor office with his hands clasped behind his back and stared out while he considered what he’d just heard.

  He wasn’t alone. Fehmi Kuzey, the man in charge of the Z Directorate, was seated across from his desk. Short and rotund in an almost risible contrast to his boss, Celaleddin’s second in command was watching the commander in respectful silence while gently teasing his fluffy trapezoidal goatee.

  The briefing had been unusually long. The commander’s time was normally sparsely meted out. In this case, however, it had lasted over an hour, during which time they’d listened to the entire recording together.

  The silence bore down on Kuzey, but he was used to it. The commander of the Hafiye was a thoughtful, calculating man. Which was only appropriate, given the gravity of the decisions he had to make on an almost daily basis.

  “Most curious,” Celaleddin finally said.

  “I thought so,” Kuzey agreed.

  The tall man turned and edged back to his desk. “Especially given its source. Kamal Agha’s brother. An anesthesiologist, of all things.”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s a shame we don’t have the whole conversation.”

  “They changed rooms. We only had Level Three surveillance on them.”

  The commander nodded, then reached out and picked up the file, flipping to the photos of the Insider Threat Program report’s two subjects. His ostrich-like features crinkled with concentration as he stared at the face of Nisreen and flashed back to his earlier conversation with Kamal. “The wife, we know about. She can be a handful. But this doctor? He hasn’t popped up on our radar before.”

  “No, sir. His file’s clean.”

  “They’re both serious, precise individuals with, from what I can see, a stable marital situation. Not exactly the kind of people one would expect to be prone to delusion.”

  “Agreed.”

  “Or easily fooled.”

  “That’s the question.”

  He stared at Ramazan’s photo again. “That’s the question indeed: is he a gullible fool who’s being taken for a ride by some tattooed prankster? Somehow, from what I’ve heard about her, I don’t see Nisreen Hatun marrying someone that naïve.”

  “It is, however, the most rational explanation,” Kuzey offered. He hesitated, then added, “But if it were actually true—”

  Celaleddin cut him off. “What is true is that, whether they’re being pranked or not, they’ve chosen to run with it. With something that’s haram. And that’s something the empire can’t tolerate.”

  Kuzey straightened, evidently chastised. “Which is why I felt I had to bring it to you, pasha.”

  “You did well,” the commander said, extending some relief to his lieutenant. “But this needs to be shut down quickly, and permanently. We can’t allow this kind of thinking to prosper unpunished.”

  “No, my bey.”

  “The key is obviously the patient. He’s the root of it all. It’s clear he’s having a grand old time pulling the anesthesiologist’s leg, even while knowing the consequences for himself and for them. He’s still at the hospital?”

  “Room seven at the ICU.”

  “Send someone there. If he can be moved without too much damage to his health, bring him in.”

  “And the anesthesiologist?”

  “Raise him to full eyes and ears. And put Nisreen Hatun on it, too. But no need to bring them in for now, especially her. We can do that once we understand what their mystery man is really up to.”

  Kuzey stood up, bowed, and left the room.

  Celaleddin watched him leave, then stepped across to the window and stared out again.

  Ludicrous, he thought. The whole thing was ludicrous. Fascinating, but ludicrous.

  He hung on to that thought, even though he couldn’t escape the disturbing fissure of doubt that had already begun to crack through his certainty.

  * * *

  Kamal glanced at his phone yet again, willing it to ring.

  He and Taymoor, both in plain clothes, were sitting in an unmarked sedan, parked around the corner from the Luxembourg Palace and in sight of the offices of the Bereket Arabian Bank, where the banker who was suspected of funneling money to an extremist preacher worked.

  Electronic surveillance still hadn’t yielded any results: the banker and his co-conspirators were clearly making sure they didn’t leave a digital trail behind. Which meant old-fashioned legwork was necessary.

  Taymoor seemed focused on something on his phone, but Kamal knew that his partner was clea
rly aware of his own restlessness. He had asked Kamal what the summons to see Celaleddin had been about. Kamal had replied that it was to inform him about the potential medal, which had made his partner question why he hadn’t been invited up as well. Kamal hadn’t been able to come up with a convincing reply quickly enough and had brushed it off, simply claiming he had no idea.

  He checked the reception indicator, even though he already knew that the signal around him was strong. Sure enough, it displayed full bars. But still nothing from Ramazan.

  He moved to exit the car and call him again, then hesitated.

  “You okay, brother?” Taymoor asked.

  “Yes,” Kamal muttered, his brow knotted in a frown that hadn’t left it since the morning.

  Then Taymoor’s phone rang, a relief from the question as well as a frustration that it wasn’t his own phone ringing.

  * * *

  Taymoor knew what the call was about the instant he heard the man’s voice.

  “It’s ramping up.” It was “A”—Ali Huseyin, the Z agent who had called him about Kamal’s brother being put under surveillance.

  Taymoor turned slightly and kept a pretense of casual breeziness while he pressed the side button on his phone to lower the volume of the caller’s voice. The noise coming off the street through the car’s open windows would also help mask the content of what was coming through. “Tell me more.”

  “I’m not sure. It’s been quarantined. All I know is some new information came in overnight and they’re taking it seriously.”

  “How so?”

  “It’s gone upstairs.”

  Taymoor stiffened.

  What had Kamal’s brother got himself into, and did it have anything to do with Nisreen? It had to, surely. She had dragged her husband into some unsavory business. And now Kamal was getting dragged into it, too. That had to be why he’d been called up to see Celaleddin earlier—which was what Taymoor had suspected.

  He hazarded a side glance at his partner. Kamal seemed focused elsewhere and unconcerned by Taymoor’s call.

  How much does he know? Taymoor wondered. Should I tell him?

  He knew he shouldn’t. He needed to tread very carefully.

  “Find out what you can,” he told his caller, trying to put a lid on the anger that was roiling inside him.

  “I told you: it’s gone dark.”

  “Find out,” he repeated, his tone even but firm. “And let me know. As soon as you can.”

  “Okay, I will, but listen to me, Taymoor. I need you to be careful. For all of us.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll call you later.”

  He clicked off and glanced at Kamal again, unsure about how to handle the information he’d just been given.

  Kamal had just dialed someone.

  * * *

  Kamal was oblivious to Taymoor’s phone call.

  His mind was elsewhere. He was still walking an emotional tightwire. He kept thinking about calling Nisreen himself, but so many reasons pulled him back from making that call, not least of which was the fact that, assuming the best—assuming she had nothing to do with the underground group—he couldn’t face having her find out about the playwright’s fate from him.

  With Taymoor distracted, he picked up his phone and speed-dialed his brother again.

  Pick up, damn it, he swore inwardly.

  To no avail.

  The call just rang through to voice mail as it had before. He killed the call just as Taymoor ended his own.

  They looked at each other uncomfortably. Then Kamal noticed something up ahead: a middle-aged, slightly stooped man with round metal spectacles and a pointy waxed moustache was stepping out of the building. He had a leather satchel slung over his shoulder and one arm firmly across it.

  “That’s our man,” Kamal said, pointing at him.

  “I wonder what he’s got in that case.”

  “The guy’s being overly careful. I doubt he’d be walking around with anything incriminating.”

  Taymoor seemed more highly strung than usual. “There’s only one way to find out.” And with that, he flung the car door open and climbed out.

  Before Kamal could react, Taymoor was taking big strides across the street, straight at the banker.

  As Kamal rushed out of the car himself, he saw Taymoor bring out something that had been hidden from view in his sleeve, an extendable steel baton. He watched as his partner flicked his wrist to expand it to its full size all while beelining at the oblivious banker like a missile locked on its target.

  “Taymoor,” Kamal called out as he sprinted after him—but it was to no avail. His partner had reached his quarry.

  The banker turned at Kamal’s shout, then froze with alarm as he saw Taymoor bearing down on him.

  “Masal kheir, effendi.” Taymoor greeted him with an icy smile, but, before the banker could react, the smile turned into clenched teeth as Taymoor raised the baton and struck the banker viciously hard across the shoulder with it.

  The blow was monstrous. The banker lost his footing and stumbled across the sidewalk, slamming against the side of a parked car. Taymoor was right in his slipstream.

  “Be careful, effendi. These sidewalks can be very slippery,” he snarled as he grabbed him by the collar and spun him around so he was facing him.

  “Taymoor,” Kamal called out as he rushed over, stopping to avoid a passing car whose driver blared his horn before thundering past.

  The banker held a hand against his injured shoulder, his pained face looking at Taymoor in confused terror. “What are you—”

  “Let me help you with this,” Taymoor said, ignoring his plea and yanking the satchel off his shoulder. “You really shouldn’t be carrying anything too heavy in your condition.”

  Kamal finally reached him. “Taymoor, what are you doing?”

  “Just helping out a fellow citizen,” he said before he suddenly turned to the banker, grabbed his injured arm, and extended it firmly so it was fully outstretched, holding the man’s hand against the roof of the car. Then he brought down his baton in one ferocious swing, striking the banker’s forearm full force midway between his wrist and elbow.

  The sound of snapping bone was unmistakable.

  The banker yelped with pain as his legs gave out from under him and he crumpled to the ground, his back to the car.

  Kamal watched in stunned silence as Taymoor scowled at the fallen man, then walked away, toward Kamal, casually, as if nothing had happened. Behind him, terrified pedestrians were cautiously moving closer to help the stricken banker.

  Taymoor walked past Kamal, heading back to their car.

  “What the hell was that?” Kamal growled at him.

  Taymoor held up the case. “We’ll soon find out.”

  Kamal grabbed him by the shoulder and flung him around to face him. “That wasn’t our brief. You didn’t need to do that.”

  “Brother. We’ve wasted enough time playing cat and mouse with these bastards,” Taymoor shot back. “What if this one slips through our net? What if we don’t stop them in time?”

  “We don’t know if he’s guilty of anything,” Kamal insisted. “He’s just a suspect.”

  “When it comes to these fuckers, that’s good enough for me,” Taymoor replied. “Besides, I might have just done him the biggest favor of his life.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Maybe he’ll take this as a serious warning. Maybe it’ll be a much-needed wake-up call and he’ll realize that he needs to stop doing what he’s doing before something much more serious happens to him.”

  Kamal was infuriated, but he had something more pressing on his mind. He didn’t want to escalate it. Not now. It would have to wait.

  But he couldn’t stay there either.

  “Fine. You deal with the report. I’ve got to go.”

  He walked off.

  “Where the hell do you think you’re going?” Taymoor called out after him.

  Kamal waved him off without turning. “I’v
e got to take care of something.”

  “Seriously? We’re in the middle of—”

  “I’ll catch up with you as soon as I can,” he shouted back. And without pausing for a follow-up question, he walked away, picking up his step as he pulled out his phone and tried Ramazan again while scouring the street for a taxi.

  * * *

  Ramazan felt the phone in the pocket of his lab coat vibrate but ignored it. It still unsettled him. He’d had a call and a message from his brother earlier, which he hadn’t returned. He wondered if that was him calling again. Whatever Kamal was calling about, it couldn’t be welcome news. Which was the last thing he needed right now, given that he was in the process of bringing the tattooed man out of his induced sleep.

  He’d arranged to meet Fonseca in Rasheed’s room but had slipped down to the ICU as quickly as he could, ahead of the agreed time. He figured he had about fifteen minutes before Fonseca showed up. It was tight, but with a bit of luck, it would be enough to get the information he needed.

  He watched nervously as Rasheed stirred to life, and checked his watch. Fonseca was maniacally punctual. His window was shutting rapidly.

  Rasheed’s eyes opened, taking in their surroundings. Ramazan watched as they roamed in ever-widening arcs and finally settled on his face. The man’s face was slightly clenched in the familiar confusion Ramazan had seen before.

  “Your excellency,” he said, maintaining the drug flow. “How are you feeling?”

  The man started to form a word through visibly dry lips and was about to answer when Ramazan heard talking outside the room.

  It was Fonseca.

  29

  Ramazan didn’t know what to do. Moving on instinct, he quickly turned the IV feed back up. He watched in panic as Rasheed’s eyes took on a distant look before they rolled upward and disappeared behind closed lids just as the door swung open and Fonseca stepped in. The surgeon was accompanied by one of the nurses.